A while back, I wrote a post that I still find to be an extremely valuable, but somewhat idealistic, way to manage your finances on Eker’s Jars budgeting. One of the accounts he recommend setting up is called a Long Term Savings for Spending account. He recommends saving 10% of your income towards this ‘jar’ and you can divide it into sub-jars if needed.

I also found and use the amazing site SmartyPig for Long Term Savings for Spending accounts. This amazing system has gained so much in popularity, its now being bought out by BBVA Compass.

So, now that I am fortunate enough to be making a little more income with my new business, I am eager to get beyond debt and expense payoff, and focus a little more on the long term savings for spending accounts. However, I think I have gone of the deep end. When I actually make a list (ie mini savings accounts) of all the things we want to save for, it is daunting and frankly, way more than 10% of our income. I have reached $5K in a Contingency Fund and have decided that is enough for me to warrant putting funds towards long term savings for spending now.

Here’s All the LTSS Funds I’ve Got Set Up:

I’m thinking this is largely because of the stage of life we are in. Not quite thirty, wanting to make large purchases and build a family. We have our house on the market, and ideally would like to have 60 to buy the next house we want. But that is so unrealistic when you actually look at the numbers. Needless to say, I’ve decided that Eker’s Jar’s needs an upgrade that should be different based on your AGE and/or STAGE in life.

Also, I have so many graduations, weddings and gifts, that my jar for GIFTS is truly for gifts, not charity or giving in the sense that Eker intended.

So, ideally I would like to mimic the jars theory that Eker has, but in reality, I believe it is better suited for a higher income, slightly older demographic than my family.

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Dying  Your Hair at Home without it Turning Green or Orange

Rainbows Might be Pretty, but Its Not What I Have in Mind!

This post is for the ladies, but if you’re a guy, send it to your friends, girlfriends or wife, they’ll thank you!

First off a note: Use this ‘advice’ at your own risk. I take absolutely no claims for your own use or misuse of hair dying products. This post is simply a few tips I’ve learned that have helped me save some money without compromising my style too much.

I have experimented with dying my own hair for years now, and I’m not going to lie, I have had some green and orange experiences.

For the dying products that I use, I like to go to Sally’s and get the professional grade products. They are very cheap, and if you know how to use them much much much more affordable than the boxed kind at the super market. Plus, the boxed kind often don’t work or leave you with the orange/green issue.

If you have golden toned hair, use products with gold in the title. If you have more grey or ash colored hair use products with ash in the title. I personally avoid all ash related products as they without a doubt can turn my hair green. I’d prefer orange to green anyway.

When things typically go wrong and leave you with orange or green hair is because you are trying to do something too drastic to your hair, your hair is over-dyed, or you aren’t using products that go well with your hair. If you get products at Sally’s ask them to help you find what goes with your hair type.

There are so many chemical factors that go into dying hair, this is why many people would prefer to go to a stylist, they don’t want to mess around with their hair and potential side effects. I forgo this to save money and take the risk. I have it down pretty well at this point.

My Most Recent Results. Not too Bad.

Using the Wella hair dye products with the developers at Sally’s has been consistent for me.  Typically I use a 1:2 ratio. One part dye to 2 parts developer. For doing highlights, I can get away with using just 1/2 ounce and 1 ounce developer. So that ends up costing me about $2 or so per time for the dye and developer used. The developer works this way: 10% will do more deposit and less lift, so its good for dark colors. 40% will do more lift so its good for lightening hair. I typically use the 40% developer for adding golden highlights to my hair.

I use a cap for highlights and then cover my head with aluminum foil. I sometimes add heat with a hair dryer to speed up the process. It can take anywhere from 10-30 minutes to get the results I want with lightening. I check often to see how its doing.

Its always good to do a sample on your hair before doing the full thing. This will prevent many many problems.

The typical rotation that I like to use to save money on hair expenses is this:

Month 1:

• Professional Hair Stylist: Color, 3/4 Highlights and Cut. Cost: About $145 + Tip
• Wash with slightly nicer than lower end Color Enhancing Shampoo / Conditioner. Deep Condition Once / Week. Cost: $15-25

Month 2:

• Semi-permanent hair shine or rinse wash to enhance the color. Cost: $5-10

Month 3 or 4:

• Do my own hair highlights with sally’s products. Cost $5 (Once you’ve purchased all the products needed, its very inexpensive to continue, but you will need to buy a brush, cap, plastic gloves and the color/developer at first)

Month 5 or 6:

• Semi-permanent hair shine or rinse to enhance color. Cost: $5-10
• Hair cut. $30-50

Month 7 or 8:

• Depending on how it looks, its back to the salon or I’ll do it myself again.

You get the gist. Again, this system isn’t perfect, but it helps me to save a lot of money without compromising on my style.

photo by mogret

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I’ve noticed a lot of blog posts and a growing movement on Twitter and the blogosphere about the topic: “move your money.” (See the site: MoveYourMoney.info). Full disclosure: I work for a local credit union in my area, and I prefer the credit union not-for-profit business model. I typically try to avoid any direct reference to where I work because that’s not what my journey is about, its about my personal finances. However, I wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the concept of “going local” with anything you buy, including where you choose to bank. To me, going local is an important part of making conscious decisions and choosing where and how to spend your money. Choosing to shop local has many benefits which I will explain in a moment.

This particular movement is coming from consumer’s anger at the big banks for being bailed out and spending OUR tax dollars for often times wasteful and frivolous purposes. Many people, including big names such as Bill Maher (watch a video from Maher), and Suze Orman are endorsing and making public statements about going local and moving your money. They believe that if enough people actually do this, it would mean that we are actually doing something big to INFLUENCE change, one individual at a time.

I have not always been a large proponent of ‘spending local’. I admit that I still (shamefully) have a BofA credit card. I don’t always remember to shop at the farmer’s market. However, the more I start to learn and educate myself about the current financial system in America, the more that I learn about the awful things that are put into my child’s toys that are from China, and the more that I truly understand the impact of shipping my hard-earned dollars out of my local community, the more I realize that choosing to spend your money local is one of the most useful things you can do for YOUR local economy and the stability of those around you.

So, if you are already choosing to shop local, or if you are considering taking it one step further, start to think of other places that you can make the choice to spend local and invest in your own community instead of communities outside of your influence.

Here’s a few suggestions for spending & keeping your money local:

• Go to your old town, specialty shops, or craft fairs for buying gifts, these stores need your support
• Stock up at the farmer’s market from local growers
• Look for local produce at your regular grocery store
• Choose a local bank or credit union (find a credit union) to save and borrow money from
• Consider going thrifty – to thrift stores and garage sales to buy things that you don’t need brand new (Better yet, swap! Check out SwapMamas.com for local swap options)
• Consider a Staycation this summer – there are many uncharted territories in your state to be discovered, its often less expensive to stay in town on your time off, and you spend local
• Eat at locally owned restaurants instead of big chains

You don’t have to give up things that you love to go local. And you don’t have to do all of the items on my list. Mainly, all that I plan to do and suggest you try, is to think twice about the options for where to spend your money, and consider making a more conscious choice when you do decide to spend.

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Not long ago, I admit that I wanted lots of “things” for birthday and holiday gifts. It is really nice to get something that you wouldn’t ordinarily buy yourself for the holidays such as lotions, electronics, books, etc.

Lately I’m a big fan of practical gifts. When you are on a tight budget, things that may once have seemed normal to spend money on such as socks, nice shampoo, getting your hair done, going to the car wash, etc, are all pushed out and minimized. What once seemed like a norm to purchase has become a luxury.

For my birthday this year, I asked my parents for a gift card to a hair salon. I just got back today and am very pleased with my do. I couldn’t think of a better gift, as I really can’t make myself justify spending the money myself, but I really, really want to get my hair done every 4 or so months.

I have had a difficult time taking care of my ‘wants’ vs. ‘needs’ list since I have had a child and we are only on my income. However, it is so great to have those things that I have had to let go be given to me on occasion.

So What’s a Practical Gift?

If you are still searching for a meaningful gift for the holidays for your family or loved ones, I suggest something creative-ly practical such as:

• A full service car wash
• Contribution to someone’s specfic savings funds
• A gift card for a restaurant + offer to baby sit
• Gas card gift certificate or auto maintenance service
• Gift card to their hair salon
• Gift card to a specialty grocery store
• Some of their favorite, but expensive snacks such as nuts, dried berries, etc

Any other creative but practical gifts that you can think of?

photo by kevindooley

Related Posts

• November 18, 2009 -- Budgeting for the Holidays and Avoiding Holiday Impulse Buys

Top Habit Changes That Help You Stick To a Budget

It can be a struggle to stay within your budget, especially around the holidays. I’ve been more actively monitoring my budget and income/expenses for a while now. I’m proud to say we did decrease our spending significantly in November. We also shifted some spending to more quality things such as education and investments.

However, unfortunately, on one income, we still spend more than we make. Not good. I’m confident our plans will take us where we need to go with this, including lifestyle changes, awareness & monitoring, conscious spending, and increased income from other areas.

1) Watching the Little Dollars – For us, its not about ‘skipping the latte’ specifically, but instead the things that you buy as habit that there are alternatives for. For example, making lunches and cutting back on eating out, even if its fast food, is healthier and cheaper.

2) Sharing the Knowledge – One of the most significant changes has been a true evaluation of what’s important to us, and a family goal of working towards our future. I have previously been managing the money more than my husband, and he is now playing a more active role. Sharing the ‘burden’ helps us be more aligned with our goals together, and has significantly minimized some of the confusion or disagreements.

3) Gotta Love Coupons – And of course, there’s nothing like the good old fashioned coupon. Its my personal belief that I have to save at least $1.00 off of something to make it worth my time. And I only use coupons for something I would have bought already.

4) Awareness & Monitoring – I’m actively monitoring my spending and money habits on Mint and Thrive, and I have weekly email reminders and alerts being sent to me. Even if I wanted to forget, too bad, I have now made it a habit not to.

5) Conscious Spending – I wrote a post about How to Curb Impulse Shopping, and for me, the online shop-a-holic, unsubscribing from tempting emails was the trick. It has significantly helped me from thinking about or wondering if I’m missing out on a good deal. Its helped me from justifying why I just have to buy something because of the bargain, since I don’t actually know about the bargain. My husband is great at sticking to the grocery list, and this saves a lot on impulse grocery buys. Overall, I’m trying to wait at least 1 day to 1 week on purchases outside of the norm to determine if they are impulsive or not. I’m not perfect at this, but this is my goal.

6) Setting Expectations with Friends & Family - This is a tough one, but it helps. I talked with my family and friends this year about cutting back on holiday spending, most of us are in the same boat, so it makes it easier. Its almost a relief when you talk about it that everyone says you don’t have to spend too much. This doesn’t mean you can’t do something thoughtful. I’m already finding that I have more quality time lined up with friends and don’t have to worry about the gifts, but instead can spend a little on the event itself.

Finally, I definitely recommend that you don’t push too hard and cut yourself some slack with changing habits. You can’t change habits overnight, or you won’t stick to them. I know that I’m too hard on myself about this, and it is okay to slip as long as you stay true to your goals overall.

Anything I should add to this list?

photo by girlonaglide

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If you are anything like me, you haven’t been as diligent as the personal finance experts recommend on saving a budget for holiday gifts.

Dream: Long Term Savings for Spending account labeled: “Holiday Gifts”.

Reality: Gift baskets with home made but thoughtful gifts

If you are in a similar situation, here are some quick tips on how to avoid impulse buys and focus your holiday spending on what really matters, thoughtfulness.

Quick Tips to Avoid Impulse Buys For the Holidays

1) Write a list before you shop and include the budget for each person

2) Don’t shop on Black Friday. I know you want to, but for those that have a problem with impulse shopping, just steer clear of any stores and instead have a left over turkey sandwich on the Friday after Thanksgiving.

3) If you don’t have a lot to spend, don’t buy gift cards. They aren’t typically as thoughtful as a small gift geared towards the person you are buying it for

Here’s a great resource for more helpful tips:
http://money.cnn.com/2009/11/18/pf/Holiday_budgeting/index.htm?section=money_latest

And of course after watching this video, I really want to go to Target on Black Friday in a frenzy to get the 32″ LCD HD TV for under $250 bucks.

photo by kevindooley

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• December 12, 2009 -- Practical Gifting for Friends & Family
• October 29, 2009 -- Shopaholic? Put a Halt to Retail Therapy
• October 27, 2009 -- Top Free Online Budgeting Money Management Tools

Day 4: Curbing my Spending Habits

Sometimes it feels like you can’t help it. Even if you aren’t a shopaholic its nearly impossible not to get a growing list of retail subscription emails that are sent to you letting you know about the latest deal and discount. For some reason, they really work on me. Especially Shutterstock.com emails. You’ll give me 10 free pictures? Wow! I’m in. Even though that equates to about $1.00, I get sold. And then of course you end up wanting to buy more. I’ve gotten really good at it. I’ve got the Firefox plugin for cash back through BigCrumbs.com. I look on RetailMeNot.com for coupon codes.

I have moved towards online shopping so much since I had a baby. I don’t have to worry about running after a toddler, I just click away at my convenience after she’s in bed.  And often I only bite with the free shipping offers. I’ve got the whole thing figured out, right?

I have a good thing going with my online shopping skills. But its getting me nowhere fast financially. I don’t go crazy either. I’m pretty thrifty. But I need to get it down to absolute minimal and get my lifestyle to do a 180 before I will continue my online shopping habits.

I’ve heard that you need to change your mind, not ‘cut up your credit cards.’ I’m not cutting the credit cards, but for me, there are certain habits that I want to change, that I know I need a little help with at the beginning until I am sure that my mind has the will power that it needs. So, for today…

Step 2 Toward Financial Freedom: No More Retail Therapy

• Unsubscribe from all retail email deals
• Remove credit card # from PayPal (this kills me! It’s much too easy to shop if your credit card number is stored online)
• No more bigcrumbs or coupon discounts. Sigh.

This is temporary right? I may struggle with this one.

Related Posts

• November 18, 2009 -- Budgeting for the Holidays and Avoiding Holiday Impulse Buys